Africa

Issued on: 02/02/2020 – 11:30Modified: 02/02/2020 – 11:32 France will deploy 600 more soldiers in the fight against Islamists militants in Africas Sahel, south of the Sahara, French Defence Minister Florence Parly said on Sunday. Advertising Read more The reinforcements would mostly be sent to the area between Mali, Burkina Faso and Niger, Parly said in a statement. Another part would join the G5 Read More – Source [contf]
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Issued on: 30/01/2020 – 17:16Modified: 30/01/2020 – 17:17 Thirty-six people have been killed in a suspected militia attack in the eastern DR Congo region of Beni, where hundreds have died in violence since November, a local official said Wednesday. Advertising Read more Congolese troops have been carrying out a military operation on an armed group in the east of the country — long plagued by various militias — and militiamen have responded with a series of massacres against civilians. "They were all hacked to death. This brings (the toll) to 36 bodies," local Beni governor Donat Kibwana told AFP, updating casualties from Tuesday's attack. Officials had earlier reported 15 fatalities. Two people with skull fractures caused by machetes have been admitted to the hospital in Oicha for surgery, an AFP reporter there said. The main attack took place late Tuesday in Manzingi, a village 20 kilometres (12 miles) northwest from Oicha, while a pastor was also killed in nearby Er..

[unable to retrieve full-text content] Two years after Liberian President George Weah stormed to power on a promise to create jobs and battle corruption in a country where the majority of people live below the poverty line, frustration with his government is growing. Many accuse Weah of gross economic mismanagement – and also of reluctRead More – Source [contf]
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Nearly 60 million people are under partial or full lockdowns in cities in China as the Wuhan coronavirus continues to spread across Asia and the rest of the world. At least 170 people are dead, and more than 7,700 cases have been confirmed in mainland China since the outbreak began in December.Several countries, including the US and Japan, have flown hundreds of their citizens out of the city. South African Pieter Viljoen, who traveled with a colleague to Wuhan for a business conference before the city's transport lockdown began, said the authorities in South Africa and its embassy in Beijing have not provided support or information about plans to repatriate them.South Africa's embassy in Beijing also declined to help when his company made private arrangements to secure a flight to get them out of the country and requested assistance and documentation to begin their evacuation process, he says.Viljoen said dozens of South Africans caught in the city's lockdown have also ..

The bank's executive board was meant to meet on Tuesday to consider the loan, but the meeting was postponed after one member requested a delay on Monday, a source at the bank told CNN. Sources did not say why the meeting was postponed. However, the request to delay came in after the bank held a last-minute emergency meeting with Tanzanian activists and international human rights organizations earlier on Monday.Last week, Tanzanian civil society groups sent a letter, seen by CNN, to the executive board urging them to stop the loan until the country passes a law that guarantees the rights of pregnant girls to attend regular secondary schools and ends mandatory pregnancy tests. CNN visited three Tanzanian schools in 2018 where girls from grades eight and up were given compulsory pregnancy tests. Bella Bird, the World Bank's Country Director for Tanzania, Burundi, Malawi and Somalia, attended the meeting on Monday, briefing the activists on why her team thought the loan should go..

Tunisias announcement late last year that it would introduce sex education starting at the primary school level was welcomed as a trailblazer in the Arab world. But the implementation has faced challenges, from a watering down on subjects considered taboo to political turmoil. Advertising Read more Introducing sex education into the school curricula is rarely an easy task across the world. So, in December 2019, when Tunisian authorities announced they would introduce a sex education programme for primary and high school students, it was hailed as yet another example of the North African nations leading womens rights in the Arab world. The move marked the first time an Arab country would be introducing sex education to primary school students as young as five-year-olds. It would also make Tunisia the only Arab nation to provide sex education in schools after Lebanon scrapped its programme for 12-to-14-year-olds in 2000 over concerns it would “provoke perversions”. After several ..

Issued on: 29/01/2020 – 14:09Modified: 29/01/2020 – 14:09 In Togo, the sorting and recycling of waste is beginning to take off. In the capital Lomé, a series of initiatives – from business ventures to schools and leisure – are helping to sow the seeds of environmental awareness. Our team reports. Advertising A programme prepared Read More – Source [contf]
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Issued on: 28/01/2020 – 23:12Modified: 28/01/2020 – 23:12 In tonight's edition: Tens of thousands of people took to the streets on Tuesday across northern Ethiopia demanding answers from the government over the kidnapping of 27 students over 50 days ago. In DR Congo, the country has experimented with Tshisekedi's flagship reform for free primary schools. And a ban on dreadlocks in Malawian classrooms is reversed afRead More – Source [contf]
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Issued on: 28/01/2020 – 16:03Modified: 28/01/2020 – 16:03 Former Ivory Coast rebel leader Guillaume Soro said on Tuesday he would not drop out of presidential elections set for the end of the year, despite an arrest warrant out against him. Advertising Read more “I definitely remain a candidate in the election. Those who tried to stop me from going back to my homeland will not stop me from being a candidate,” Soro told Reuters in Paris. Ivory Coasts public prosecutor issued the warrant for Soro on Dec. 23 as part of an investigation into an alleged coup plot. Soro denied any wrongdoing and said he was a victim of judicial persecution. “Mercenaries made illegal recordings thinking they can entrap me,” he said. “My lawyers have filed a case in Paris against the authors and prosecutor because part of(the alleged recording) was done in France.” Soro added that his lawyers had placed a request with French prosecutors for his rights to be respected, and will do the same with the r..

Issued on: 28/01/2020 – 12:01Modified: 28/01/2020 – 12:01 Suspected Islamic extremists attacked a busy market in Burkina Faso and killed more than 30 people over the weekend, authorities said, as the West African countrys security situation deteriorates. Advertising Read more The death toll could be as high as 50, Burkina Fasos national television reported Monday evening. It was the second attack in northern Burkina Faso in a week that has left dozens dead. Meanwhile, the Norwegian Refugee Council warned that as many as 900,000 people could be displaced in the country by April, up from current estimates of 560,000. Information about the latest violence in Silgadji in Soum province was difficult to obtain because the jihadists reportedly disabled the local phone network before the massacre near the countrys troubled border with Mali. Days earlier, militants killed 36 civilians in a marketplace in neighboring Sanmatenga province. Extremist attacks are dramatically escalating ..